WILLY-NILLY TOWN PLANNING

It was just one street away. The sign had gone up: the proposal that had been submitted for planning approval was described briefly in planning terms as a scheme to build three houses on one block: for more details go to the Council website. Gosh, three! Might one object to this? - submissions close 30 April 2019. One was in two minds: “What’s the point,” was the first response; then the next idea; “ONE MUST!” - but why when one knows the history of such matters? It was decided that the time would be better spent penning this piece.

Not too long ago, just up the road, another block had advertised a project to construct two separate houses on the one block. One did respond to this, pointing out that such developments were not believed to be in the published Town Plan for the area, and that one had an expectation that the Plan for the region might be properly enforced, as a precedent can easily be created: could everyone in the area get a second or third house on the one block approved? Why not? The project was approved with no explanation: no one appeared to be worried about the trend. The houses are now under construction. It was this seemingly brash carelessness with developments that made the mind up: it would be a complete waste of time to object to the three-house project; it has probably already been approved – this is Gold Coast planning! . . . and the precedent has been established. The prediction is that we will only see more of this type of project: an increase in both the number of applications, and the number of houses per block. As with heights, quantity only grows exponentially.

One knows that the developer would have had meetings to discuss the project with the planners who might even have suggested a particular planning firm, (of mates?), to use to ensure that the ‘appropriate’ approach is spelled out in the application to make it easy to approve. It seems that some firms are more canny than others. Once the development submission has been made, if there are any objections, then the approving planner can simply create a few ‘countering’ conditions to ensure that the project goes ahead – all “in accordance with the Town Plan,” when it is perhaps not strictly so; it depends on how one reads or interprets the plan. Clever, vague phrases are coined as special conditions: to the engineer’s approval, and the like, oversight and restrictions that seem to say nothing other than whatever it takes. These are the processes that thwart the very best efforts to get the Plan enforced – alas, protests prove to be futile, such is the power of the planner!

Now one might hear the cry, “You are too cynical,” but this is not so. History has shown how the Gold Coast Council planners can be manipulative. It is not only the snide creation of ‘countering’ conditions that one is concerned about, or the suggested methods to ensure approval, but also the ‘positive’ supporting submissions that might have been generated, prompted perhaps, by the local Councillor, that are given standing, an importance that allows them to be used to dismiss the negative objections – tit-for-tat. Ten of one wipes out ten of the other, as if any issues raised were meaningless; the rest of the ‘uncountered’ objections, if any, form the basis for special conditions, as if this was a game where scores are kept and manipulated to fabricate the outcome: win/lose - winner! ‘Scores’ are indeed kept, or so it appears, but these have more to do with Council not forgetting who it was that caused the ‘difficulty.’

So why might one even get angry about Town Plans being ignored or shrewdly manipulated when this flippant high jinks goes on? It truly is a waste of time to write an objection, even though it might be based on solid evidence and seek to promote a rigorous strategy for planning enforcement: but still one can hear the cynic's cries. No, one does have one’s feet well planted on the ground. On the Gold Coast there have been applications that have openly listed the approving planner as a consultant planner or adviser for the submission, as if this might not be a problem! How could this be possible? - but it has happened. So it is obvious why one is reluctant to yet again spend time and hopefully submit a considered,  written objection to a proposal that should perhaps never even have been contemplated given the intent of the Town Plan for a region.

Plans need rigour in both their application and their enforcement, so that developers would know that certain submissions should never ever be considered: but it is not working like this. Plans are written and interpreted as general, broad guidelines only; almost as a series of suggestions; a set of broad, schematic indicators ready for the details to be filled in only when the applications appear. Developers can chat with Council and negotiate outcomes that identify what will be approved prior to any public advertising. Indeed, it has been seen that Council officers, (Brisbane City Council), have already reviewed and commented upon the application in specific detail prior to any public notification, as if Council might be colluding, ensuring that the project can be cleared to go ahead promptly? When challenged about this apparent duplicity, Gold Coast Council officers say that they get involved in order to improve the quality of the applications. Surely other professionals are there to provide quality services to developers? Why should Council be concerned about rejecting poor applications? Yet another group of planners, (BCC), said that they prefer to get involved so that schemes do not go to court where everything is left in the hands of the judge who might know nothing about planning and the issues involved.

This is Queensland, where Town Plans appear to be written as guides for negotiation. An area might have a height limit of three storeys defined in the Town Plan, but some clever developer/architect can apparently come in and persuade the Council to approve a seven story scheme plus a penthouse - that sounds like eight to me – all because of the ‘quality’ of the project, its self-proclaimed prestige, and a new public way, a lane beside the new eight levels: and this gets agreed to in spite of the neighbours’ objections and the Town Plan. The name of the game is ‘trade-offs’ - see: https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2018/02/virginia-kerridge-seriality-of.html Why bother with any rules? Indeed, Gold Coast Council has proposed an open height limit – whatever one wants! It appears as though this strategy of no controls is bleeding into all aspects of planning, leaving one to suggest that the planning profession should be abolished. It would seem that the absence of planners would make little difference to the outcomes.

Back to the couple of blocks in the area that we started with, one can see the results of such a careless, lazy and uncommitted planning process where, perhaps, ‘mates’ seem to get what they want. Here, in this typical one house per block suburban residential  arrangement, one can now see two, (and soon three?), houses clustering on to the one block; various houses of sundry colours from white to ochre, to purple and black, in spite of the Local Area Plan; houses with converted flats; sites with multiple flats on them; sites with separate granny flats in the backyard; a pie shop on a corner; an aged people’s home nearby; a police station around the corner; a four story apartment building; a three story child care centre; a single-story medical centre; a Guides Hall; . . . and this has all been a ‘planned’ area? One looks at the towns and villages of old and drools at the cohesive mix of expression that embodies a sense of place and spirit that enlivens diversity with coherence – or is it coherence with diversity? What we are ending up with is a completely meaningless shambles shaped by and for self-interest - whatever. We need much better.

We need plans that have plans, defined ideas and visions that are approached and applied with rigour and strict rules so that futures are known, anticipated, predicted, not the results of some casual, friendly, chatty negotiations that allow anything smart words can justify. This is not planning; it is scheming; playing with semantics and people’s lives. Who knows what who is gaining out of these games? Who knows what who is losing out of the process of making place like this?

Are these Plans are the result of some false idea of fair play for all – of natural justice? They are meaningless documents that should not exist. At present they seem to come into being just because the State Government demands that such documents are prepared. It is a shame that no one appears to care about visions and enforcement. Our towns and cities are getting misshaped, deformed by lazy carelessness and rampant greed.

One might ask: why worry about multiple dwellings? Well, there is a case nearby where a colleague wanted an extension. As a part of this approval, a document had to be signed to ensure that the extension was never going to be used as a flat, or separate apartment! This is why: planners can be pedantic when they choose, bitchy, but generally sloppy otherwise, whenever and wherever they deem desirable; whatever suits them. Who cares if the extension might become a separate apartment when there are so many others around? This is not planning! So why object when any number of houses appears likely to be approved? This is willy-nilly dealing. Why worry, as MAD magazine used to proclaim?

Then there is the situation where Council has been told about serious, non-conforming issues in the nearby street, matters like fencing two metres off alignment into the public footpath zone; fences four metres high (maximum two metres); decks to the front boundary (setback of six metres specified); structures over 13 metres tall (max 9.5m); and the like, but no one cares: no one at all. Council merely says that everything has been ‘approved’! Why? The message is: “Go away; we’ll do what we want!”

 Yes, it seems it is willy-nilly planning. Little wonder that our world is fragmenting into a shambles of a chaos where serious mental health problems are on the rise. We lack that ringing support of enrichment in our lives that place can give. We need better than this mess if we are going to enhance our being, and our being here. Place is important, just as good planning is critical for quality outcomes.

One concern is that planning deals only with broad, notional diagrams, (just look at the illustrations here taken form a Google Images search 'Town Planning'). Planning cares little for real, complete, cohesive, interrelated outcomes. Details are almost irrelevant; indeed, they are considered a nuisance. Only the broad intent is actual as logic and descriptive language, never as experienced consequences. Planning does not concern itself with lives and living; just arrangements, diagrams and numbers that relate to a vaguely rational theory or someone's grand vision. The profession is given enormous power, but it carries little substance when it comes to meaningful existence: it lacks depth and rigour; care and concern. Yet the detailed outcomes are critical; these are what we live with everyday. Architects potentially make better planners than the trained specialists.

Christopher Alexander has grappled with the problem of quality - cohesive, and useful, meaningful planning outcomes - in his books, starting with A Pattern Language Towns. Buildings. Construction and finishing, to date, with The Nature of Order. These publications should be mandatory reading for planners. Alas, planners look only at dumb patterns, diagrams, profiles and numbers and ignore the personal messages. This approach is meaningful neither for life nor living; it will do nothing for these circumstances other than continue to frustrate. The situation is not at all useful in any way other than being manipulative: mind mangling matter - and this willy-nilly town planning process is shaping place for our lives.

THE GAME OF BROCHS

There are charming, persuasive ideas that seem to gain such traction that they obscure reality. It might be something perceptual, conceptual, like looking at a table in a flea market – see: https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2019/03/the-little-bowl-importance-significance.html  Here there is such a shambles of varying interest that one is not really able to see what is literally before one’s eye. Broch thinking seems to have much of the same quality. When the issue is finally seen for what it truly is, one wonders why it was even considered, not previously questioned and immediately discarded. One is astonished that the matter was ever held as a reasonable proposition at all. The issue that has come to mind is the debate over scaffolding, the construction method. One proposition has it that the dry stone walls were built without scaffolding, from the space between the walls.

Now this idea might appear to be reasonable, something like thinking outside of the square when one is looking at the tiny cross sectional illustration of Mousa or the typical broch. The Lateral Thinking author, Edward de Bono, might be pleased. Diagrammatically it looks to be an excellent proposition - creative too: but one only has to look up Wikipedia to see that Mousa Broch is 15.3 metres diameter at ground level externally, 6.1 metres diameter internally, and 13.2 metres high. Simple maths tells us that the base walls are 4.6 metres thick. It is self-evident that this mass must have been erected by workers on both sides of this form, on top and between. A couple of attempts have been made to build a replica broch to get a feel for the possibilities of process, but these have not gone much higher than the scarcement level, the ‘base’ height of the broch. Above this mass that has a variety of open spaces of various forms modelled into it, the walls become a twin element. The section of Mousa makes this very clear.

Dimensionally, one can guess that the thickness of these dry stone walls has to be about one third of the width of the base – that is, about 1.5 metres, making each lift a square mass of stones that narrows progressively with height, perhaps being about 1 metre wide at the very top. Once the actual sizes of these various elements are realised, it must become clear that any theory about building from the centre alone, from between the walls, must be questioned and abandoned, just as the process of placing the stones from one side only has to be queried and dismissed. There is a limit to the reach of one person that the years have not changed.

see: https://thestonetrust.org/resource-information/how-to/

One has to come to understand that these structures were built from scaffolding and from the in-between zone: from anywhere and everywhere. Trying to imagine the handling of the stones to get them into place makes one speculate that the twin walls were erected separately and did not rise in parallel as the neat mind might like to envisage. Could the inside wall have been completed first to the limit of its lift – about 1500mm – with the outer wall being finished next? The walls could easily be set out separately given the central reference. Once the outer wall was completed, the final layer of stones and bridging stones could then be put in place on both walls, providing a base for the next lift. This process would minimise the awkward process of handling the stones to get them over the work into the interior of the broch. While some stockpile of stones would still be required inside, the progressive building of the twin walls would mean that most stones could be lifted from an exterior source, direct to the workplace that would require planking to be placed on top of the bridging stones to make a work platform.

see: https://thestonetrust.org/resource-information/how-to/

This sample twin wall looks straight and scaled down - ?

So it seems likely that the linear spacing of the walls was also used for building access, along with external and internal scaffolding. Workmen must have accessed the in-between space from the open end of the twin structure. Just why any other process might be contemplated remains a mystery, such is the size and scale of these structures – that mystery of not seeing exactly what is before one’s eyes. Brochs have to be thought of a structures built by people and used by people, in fact, in the real world, in order to interpret them successfully.

We need much more clear thinking about brochs. Muddled thinking makes impossible dreams hopeful, like the structure spanning 6.1 metres being illustrated as two, narrowly-spaced parallel lines. Such fuzzy nonsense only confuses and confounds. Rigour is required, that scientific questioning and testing that challenges theories with facts, because it is too easy to promote silly fictions. Are we programmed to be deluded by fantasies? Why are we so persuaded by wistful dreams? Does our era spend too much time drooling over fictions - The Game of Brochs?

MORE ON BUILDING BROCHS – THINKING DOODLES

The papers from the preparation of BUILDING BROCHS, see - https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2019/04/building-brochs.html, were lying around as the coffee was poured the next morning; the pens were still there. One soon discovers the value of a mess. The eye looked at the preliminary round house plan again: might the posts be erected first? A sketch of the posts was made. Yes – it seemed likely: the centre could be identified and the hexagon marked out on the ground with a peg and a length of string. Then the holes would have to be dug and the poles erected, aligned and braced. This could all be done without the encumbrance of the walls that not only limited the construction area, but also restricted access to one location. The idea had practical merit.

Typical round house plans

The timber frame was drawn as it might look. From this start, the set out of the circle for the stone walls could begin. The timber frame became a permanent reference marker for location and orientation. Pegs, string and a template was all that was required to mark the circle. This could be managed progressively too, as the wall was constructed. It would be difficult to maintain the markings of the set out of the complete circle on a building site. With the core identified, the whole round house was able to be set out piecemeal. Once the walls had been erected, the roof could be finished, linking the walls to the central frame conically. It made practical sense: the challenges of building sites do not change with time. It is an environment in which precise set outs have to be achieved in the context of a dirty shambles. Might the broch have started similarly?

Typical broch plans

The rough sketch for the process of setting out concentric circles was picked up and perused. The pen began its scribblings. Peg locations could easily be marked out after the erection of the hexagonal frame that defined the centre. Parts of the walls were drawn in; a section was sketched. Once the braced frame was in place, the profiles of the walls could be set up radially on the ground and the walls begun. Once the first profile height had been completed, the first lift could occur. This would entail temporary scaffolding: the pens scrawled out a possibility. Inside and outside would have to align so that the profiles could be supported. The first lift would have the solid stone base as the support.

Stones could be lifted up to the working level of the scaffold. Once finished, the first lift would have reached the scarcement level. The scarcement would have been installed at this time as projecting slabs of stone; then joists could be put in place: but! - the scarcement needs mass above it for it to be a solid, stable, load-bearing element.* A temporary prop is needed to support the scarcement or the joists until the upper inner wall has sufficient mass to counter the floor load. Here one thinks of the temporary props used for concrete work; these stay in place until the concrete has cured and gained sufficient strength - usually about 28 days. Once the joists are in place, the next set of hexagonal poles could then be positioned. These would have to be joined so as to maintain the geometry of the hexagonal reference used for the set out. The doodling seemed to be giving substance, clarification to some lingering unknowns, even revealing new issues that had never before been noticed.

The beginnings of yesterday’s broch section scribble was picked up. Why not sketch in the parts here to consider the impacts? Ladders were drawn on the timber frame and a different roof was drawn in: maybe? A red pen was picked up to consider the scaffolding. Temporary scaffolds would be required inside as well as the permanent framing. These platforms needed to be co-ordinated with the temporary external scaffold to provide support for the wall profiles: but what holds the profile up between the walls? The stone ties could do this. Ah! Each lift in the scaffolding could also mark the position of the bridging stones that would be installed along with the top stones of each lift. Interesting.

The progressive lifts of the dry stone work are illustrated in this cross section.

The piles of stones were marked in to test the idea. Yes, the rocks could be placed at the working levels as things progressed. The space inside the hexagonal framing would be available for lifting, as well as for general access: but by this time, the broch entry would have been formed, limiting easy access to this lift area. Maybe the stones were transferred from the massive external piles with a lifting device that could deliver stones to the working platforms externally, and swing them over the walls onto the central, internal scaffold. This appeared to be a more practical and flexible arrangement. The floor joists were drawn in on yet another scribbled plan to see how they might set out. The radial pattern would concentrate the timbers at the hexagonal frame, and limit the minimum spacing. This seemed not to be a problem; but what material was used for flooring? Timber planks seems to be the first guess, but was this wood available? Might mats and clay have been used? The material would finally define the required joist spacing.*

Diagrammatic structural diagrams do not clarify or resolve thinking on brochs;

they only confuse, confound, and complicate.

The more one scribbled, the more things seemed to come together, or be further challenged. Everything appeared to confirm that the building of the broch started with the erection of the hexagonal timber frame that was the place marker, permanent set out reference for the circles, and the vertical axis for the alignment of the height of the walls. The system seemed to pass the building site test, and even offered a solution to the handling of the massive quantities of stone that were required at the various working levels. The permanent portions of the interior scaffold could be installed progressively, with the temporary scaffolding coming and going within this main framework that was supported at its perimeter by the scarcement, and centrally by the hexagonal frame. Once the dry stone walls had been completed, the lower temporary props for the scarcement loadings could be removed.

Could the lower space have been like the byre of the black house, dug out every summer?

This space could also be seen as incorporating the equivalent of the store area of the black house,

with the living space above rather than being parallel to it.

The set out plan diagram was returned to. Of course! The building process would have been started with a ceremony. Even today we have the laying of the foundation stone. One could envisage the marking of place, the axis mundi, the symbolic centre of the earth – the centre of the hexagon – with fire and smoke. Australian aboriginals have a smoking ceremony to cleanse space and place. One could imagine a priest or a shaman involved in a ceremony celebrating the beginning of this great enterprise, drawing the hexagon, placating the gods and blessing the land. It has always seemed that the lack of any spiritual explanation in the broch studies has been a fundamental weakness. To ancient man, the whole world was meaningful, symbolic. The building of the broch would have involved a spiritual celebration. Might the hexagon have meaning; the numbers 3, 6, 12? The Star of David was never just a Jewish symbol.#

The meaning of the beginning would always be the anchor of place; would always be there for remembrance, defining the connection between man and God: earth and heaven – the mystery of life itself. The axis mundi was there as nothing but everything, shaped by the hexagon. The hearth would become the permanent core, the anchor of life and space, with smoke rising into the heavens creating the ephemeral physical link between life and its enigmas. Tradition has always spoken about the importance of remembrance, of the importance of returning to, of remembering our origins. The beginnings of the broch would remain as a central reference, not only throughout its construction period for set out and scaffolding, but also for the whole life of the place, there for the everyday, for continued renewal of the spirit and the placation of the Gods.

The efforts to interpret broch functions must to go beyond the search for mere practical purposes.

They need to consider the spiritual context, and its symbolism.

Compare this roof with new 'iron age' roof images below.

Slowly, as one doodled and thought about the broch, the practicalities of construction and life became intertwined with things real and tangible; mystical and spiritual. This coherence resonated with reality: we cannot overlook the mysteries of life and the role they have played, and still play. Architecture has always involved these; but today we seem to have forgotten this. One only has to flick through Sir Banister Fletcher’s A History of Architecture to see the thousands of historical structures rooted in the search for and celebration of meaning. Brochs could not have been removed from this involvement.

Today’s ponderings started with the scribbles on the round house plan, so this doodle was looked at again in order to test the theories revealed by the other scribbles. How might the idea of the priest/shaman/symbolism feel with the construction of the round house, the precursor of the broch?

The scan of Mousa broch showing its axial reference.

The pen was picked up again and wandered its way around the hearth marked on the plan. Yes, it would be like this. The point would be marked on the ground and the hexagon set out, just as we have ground-breaking ceremonies; the fire lit, the smoke rising as the blessings were chanted and danced into reality: real place was being marked and blessed to become the centre, not only of a structure, a permanent marker for its making, but also for life itself. The idea made wonderful sense in the simplicity of the round house. From this mystical centre, the hexagon could rise to become the markers for the circle, an enclosure both symbolic and real, reconciled by the structure of the roof. The void of the axis - the untouchable, unspeakable; that which cannot be named - is there, revealed as a location within the geometrical forming of the hexagonal frame, the hexagram, and enhanced by the conical form of the canopy. Daily life would have centred on this core, the central hearth, from which smoke would rise as the axis, co-joining man with spirit, even as food was being prepared. Every activity would relate to this place, just as it would in the broch. The layering and inter-relationship of logic and dreams in this theory enrich it and give it substance – poetic credence.

What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.

T.S. Eliot

#

 SYMBOLISM OF THE HEXAGRAM

As an aside, for a discussion of the symbolism of the hexagram, see:

https://masonicfind.com/an-ancient-star

Photo: Duncan-Enzmann, solstice symbol, Altamira Cave, 16,500 BC

 With roots in prehistory, the evolution of this familiar symbol can be observed

with the following illustration of the winter solstice symbol, summer solstice symbol, and then combined solstices.  

Winter Solstice -Spring Equinox-Summer Solstice-Autumnal Equinox-Winter Solstice

Illustration from Solomon’s Power Brokers

As with most symbols, the hexagram gained layers of meaning as it flowed through time, adapted and adopted by cultures, coming eventually to symbolize the union of opposites: male and female, fire and water, error and truth, active and passive, darkness and light, ignorance and wisdom.

*
It is for this reason that it makes no sense to interpret the scarcement only as a support for scaffolding as Brian Smith, (Shetland Museum and Archives), has argued. One would require temporary scaffolding to support the support for temporary scaffolding. The scarcement must have had another purpose. The proposition here is that it supports the permanent internal scaffolding/framing, keeping the perimeter timbers out of the lower ground space that has been zoned as a service space, a 'wet work area,' involving perhaps animals, waste, water.

P.S.
27 APRIL 2019

MORE DOODLES; MORE THOUGHTS

The broch building site: the beginning.

The roof is difficult to tie down - see below.

Note in report below that the smoke filters through the thatch.

The black house relied on this to keep the vermin out of the roof: see - 

https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2016/12/the-arnol-blackhouse-place-culture.html

The wall profiles can easily be set up radially.

They can also be used to set out the concentric circles from the set out of the inner circle.

This process avoids the need to work over any dry stone wall for set outs.

Profiles remote from the elements being set out are still used today.

The central hexagonal frame can be likened to the 3D profile of the broch.

The joists and fire - symbolically central.

The joists can put in piecemeal to act as scaffolding for the work at whatever stage/location.

The roof can be tied down in the round house, (as below), but not to dry stone walls.

Further tie down/bracing/stiffening elements are suggested.

Note that the roof can be erected and maintained from the perimeter, much like the black house, see:

https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2016/12/the-arnol-blackhouse-place-culture.html

The temporary and permanent scaffolding.

Work can proceed on different stages in different locations.

The central hexagonal permanent structure provides the fixed reference point for all elements.

 THE NEW 'IRON AGE' ROUND HOUSE

For images of a new 'iron age' round house, see:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-2991380/Steel-overnight-stay-Devon-B-B-launches-Iron-Age-hut-guests-no-electricity-compost-toilet-just-single-cold-water-tap.html

The report says that the round house is '30 metres' in diameter; maybe it means 30 feet? The roof timbers are said to be from 28 foot lengths. Mousa broch is approximately 20 feet - 6metres - in diameter inside, (50 feet - 15 metres - outside at its base). The images give some idea of the technology and lifestyle of the era as we understand it.

If the rafters are 28 feet long, and the roof is 45 degrees pitch, then the inner diameter is close to 30 feet.

The roof would be approximately the size that would fit Mousa, to sit on its inner twin wall.

Note in the comments above the difficulty in fixing the framing to the dry stone wall.

This round house has no inner structural framing; it is tied down to the outer ring frame.

Traditional round houses do have inner posts.

Brochs would need inner framing not only for a structural profile reference, but also for floor spans.

28 APRIL 2019

Maybe everything to do with brochs is vague and uncertain?

This notice on the door of the Carloway Broch Centre tells visitors that the centre is:

Open

10am to 5pm  (or thereabouts)

Monday to Saturday

Admission Free

The scarcement of the Carloway broch is clear, but it is uncertain if it was ever a continuous row of projecting stones, or a series of separate corbels. If it was the latter, these could have carried a segmental bearer for the joists to sit on. It does not change the purpose of the scarcement as the projecting stones still require the mass above to make them stable.

NOTE
25 February 2020

see: https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2020/02/on-planning-meaning-mental-structures.htm

*

NOTE

19 October 2020

Perhaps peat could have been used. One of the oldest houses on the island of Unst in Shetland, a cottage at Haroldswick, had an internal wall constructed out of peat. Peat is plentiful; it dries to a hard mass; and is a good insulator.